A curious quirk of people that I’ve noticed as of late, is when someone gives a piece of information out in a conversation, and then returns later to say something along the lines of “Sorry, I lied, it’s actually this….” I find that interesting. I doubt that the person intentionally gave out misinformation, and then opted to out themselves later in the conversation. They could have easily just have said “I was misinformed, and this is really what I meant”, or something along those lines. It’s entirely possible that people are fairly lazy, and they’re using “lie” as a shorthand for misinformed. However, people will also attempt to justify why they believed whatever they believed to be the case, and will attempt to merge the truth with the misinformation. I myself have noticed that I do that.
I believe it may have something to do with the fact that people do not like to be seen as ignorant on wrong on whatever they are discussing. Sometimes we make mistakes, and believe something that is not true. However, whether it is ego driven or not, we seem to want to protect ourselves by giving agency to our psyche in ways that it simply does not operate. Hence why people will say “I lied, it’s actually X”. They want to be in control of whatever they are saying, even when they are flat out wrong.